Rachel Singleton of LightBringer Essences joins us on the podcast to discuss how to meet these challenging times with the help of flower essences. She shares her insights on soothing the heart and opening the crown chakra to find balance and calm during a global pandemic.

Learn more about Rachel:

• RachelSingleton.com
• LightBringer essences

Flower Essences and allies discussed during the show:

• Hawthorn Blossom and Hawthorn Berry – LightBringer, FES
• Light Support – LightBringer
• Angel Star – LightBringer
• Grass of Parnassus – LightBringer, Alaskan Essences
• Chickweed
• Cerato – Healing Herbs
• Little Cerato – Flora of Asia
• One-Flowered Wintergreen – LightBringer
• Calendula – FES

Resources and Suggestions:

• Colin Griffiths and Companion to Homeopathy book
• Madeline Evans
• Helios Homeopathic Pharmacy
• The Heart Math Solution, Doc Childre – books and website
• A Course in Miracles

Show Transcript

Kathleen Aspenns [00:00:40] Welcome back to the Flower Essence Podcast. Today, I am just delighted to be sharing this time not only with Ro, but with our guest, Rachel Singleton. Rachel Singleton is a professionally trained, Advanced Essence Practitioner. She’s studied homeopathy to post-graduate level and is a Licensed Homeopath and Member of the Lakeland College of Homeopathy. She has also completed a diploma in Therapeutic Healing with the Rowan School of Healing and is a Reiki Master. She worked for several years as a Tutor member of the British Flower and Vibrational Essence Association, an Advanced Essence Practitioner, and as a member of the committee. She has tutored students in the UK and abroad to become accredited Advance Essence Practitioners. Thank you so much for being with us. You’ve been doing this as a therapeutic practice for 20 years, working with people in the UK and you’ve also created your own line of essences, The LightBringer Essences. We are so happy to have you with us. 

Rachel Singleton [00:01:38] Thank you, Kathleen. And Ro, it is absolutely lovely to be here with you. 

Kathleen Aspenns [00:01:44] So I’d love to start a little bit with.. Just tell us. I know that you mentioned that you have a fuller, expanded version of your story and how you came to essences on your Website. But we’d love to just know a little bit about you, just to get started and get a feel for what your perspective is on essences and why you got so interested in them in the first place. 

Rachel Singleton [00:02:06] Yeah, so I actually came across them when I was training as a homeopath, so we were very fortunate to have a very forward thinking college that we were part of for homeopathy training myself and my peer group, and we all loved it. The teachers were all passionate and articulate and brilliant homeopaths and amongst them, several of them were using flower essences as part of their practice. So they felt, even with what old homeopathy could do, and with a strong correlation between so many homeopathic remedies and emotional and mental states. They still felt that there was this  whole area that essences touched and were needed for. And they would treat with the two things. So I think it was our first weekend that we walked into one of our lectures and the lecturer came in with a huge bunch of flowers and with all the Australian Bush flower essence cards and spent the next two hours blowing our minds, teaching us about this incredible healing modality. And I didn’t know, as I was about 23 at the time, I didn’t know anything about the Bach Flower Essences. I hadn’t grown up with an alternative background in any way, shape or form. And this was all new to me. And I sat back in that lecture just mesmerized, feeling like I’d absolutely come home. And just the very idea that flowers could be a medicine it just made so much sense to me. I’d grown up with my mom who is a plant historian and she’s deeply interested in everything to do with plant history, herbalism, and especially as it pertains to literature. She weaves the two together. And that’s been her life’s work all along. 

Rachel Singleton [00:04:16] So I’ve grown up with rare plants dotted all over the garden and national plant collections. And just on the other hand, going to nurseries and hanging out there once she’s propagating for somebody or other. And so plants have just been part of my life as a grown up. But this, this was a whole new relationship with them. And it was something about that soulful quality and their beauty and their grace. You know, all of these things just absolutely drew me. So I often joke that I went into my homeopathic training to be a homeopath and I came out as a flower essence practitioner because it was that. But I knew it was really what I was there for. And so I then just followed that passion for the next 20 years. And I also knew on that first afternoon that I was going to make a range of essences and that didn’t emerge until a year or two later. And I do tell that story in detail on the website. But just to say, I mean, my first attempt, I did them completely by the letter, followed Dr. Bach’s instructions and did what I was told. And actually, they didn’t do anything. You know, I gave them to my tutors and people, all excited, and they didn’t do anything. And nobody took much notice of them. They were very kind but, you know. And then I had a much more personal experience, I had the experience of losing someone I loved very much. And throughout that time, the pain was such that I found myself reaching for plants in a way that I never had before, and I was out walking one day. And I knew the only thing that could touch the suffering that I was in was something exquisite. And it was flowers. I just knew that. They spoke the language that I needed at that time and that they would come in deep and tend to me in a way that was safe and intimate and appropriate. And that would reach into all the places that it needed to reach. And that was the day that I made what I call a proper essence. And I think that sort of set the bar for me then, going forward, as to what a flower essence moment is, when we look into a flower and know it is our medicine and know that we need to connect with that at a deeper level than just to sit with the flower, we actually need to take into our being and let it do its work. So I’ve spent the last 20 years letting flowers teach me. 

Rochana Felde [00:07:22] That’s a beautiful story and I love the visual imagery of your growing up with all the rare and exotic flowers everywhere. Do you still practice homeopathy or did you ever after graduating? 

Rachel Singleton [00:07:40] Yeah, I did, actually. And it’s evolved and changed along the way. I use it in a very, very different way now. And I kind of do the opposite to what we were taught then. So I use flower essence as my main modality and I bring in a homeopathic remedy for support here and there if I need it. And what I see the homeopathic remedy doing is..  I don’t know what the word is, really. It’s not that it’s a deeper catalyst, but it’s something a little bit stronger maybe. So, you know, I feel like one of the things that essences do is very much work as a catalyst and there’s a gentle kind of suffused quality to them. And sometimes there’s a more gritty element that a homeopathic remedy can bring in, something deep and constitutional. But by and large, I would say 90 percent of the work that I’m doing is essences rather than homeopathy. 

Rochana Felde [00:08:50] So, for example, some of the homeopathic remedies are flowers that are also flower essences. And I’ve always been curious. I think Calendula might be one. There’s probably a lot of others. How they differ in, you know, is the homeopathic remedy more physical working on symptomatic issues. And then the flower essence, how would you describe the difference? Energetically. 

Rachel Singleton [00:09:26] That’s a really good question. I guess three homeopathic remedies immediately come to mind. So Aconite, Calendula, Crataegus. So Crataegus is Hawthorn, and Crataegus as a herb. If we use it in a really, really physical form is for the heart and soul, balancing, and toning the heart. And then we can use it in a really low dose homeopathically and do exactly the same thing. Or we can use it in a much higher dose to I guess go in deeper to support and catalyse the vital force within the hearts actual function is, you know, so really going in behind even the physical. And then the essence… So for example, in my range is a Hawthorn blossom, and the Hawthorn Berry and Hawthorn Blossom is for knowing the worth of what you have, so counting your blessings, and it’s one that a yearning and a pining for something else. Thinking that the grass is greener over there. So you can see how that comes back to the heart, how the heart, it’s almost like lovesick, pining, yearning. And that brings the heart out of balance so we can use Hawthorn blossom as an essence to help the person reorientate with the fact that actually, you know, they have got all these beautiful seeds in their life waiting to blossom, but they have what they need. That spirit has given them that. And Hawthorn Berry is for receiving the fruits of our labors, getting our hearts desire, so that came up with observing so many people who worked very hard but often don’t read the rewards of it. So maybe the tendency to work, and keep working, and keep working takes away from the actual sitting back and receiving what comes from that. The joy of creating and manifesting and achieving. And before they rush onto the next project, the next thing that they want to work on. And all of these are different aspects of treating the heart and working with it. So. Yeah. You know, it is fascinating to look at one plant through different modalities, isn’t it? 

[00:59:21] This podcast is meant for educational and entertainment purposes only. We are not physicians and do not diagnose, prescribe or treat medical conditions. Please consult with your own physician or healthcare practitioner regarding the suggestions and recommendations made by the hosts and guests of the Flower Essence podcast.